Major online organizations and the domain name industry gave their first responses to the decision of the US Government to step aside from the domain name designation role and oversight of the DNS root zone. As previously reported, Friday night (which is early Saturday morning in Moscow), Lawrence E. Strickling, Assistant Secretary for Communications and Information of the US Department of Commerce, addressed ICANN with a request to start the necessary action. The current agreement with the US Department of Commerce, under which the Internet Assigned Numbers Authority (IANA), accountable to ICANN, manages IP addresses and top-level domains, will expire in 2015, and obviously, a new stage in the development and management of the Internet will begin afterwards.
The early statements issued in response to the news were generally positive. Representatives of organizations responsible for technical aspects of maintenance and improvement of the global network (IETF, IAB, W3C) issued a joint statement.
“Our organizations are committed to open and transparent multi-stakeholder processes,” it reads. “The Internet technical community is strong enough to continue its role, while assuming the stewardship function as it transitions from the US Government.”
The Domain Name Association’s Executive Director Kurt Pritz noted: “The DNA welcomes a deliberate, thoughtful process, inclusive of all stakeholder views to determine the future of the IANA function.” He also gives credit to the US Government for performing its role and stresses that “any new oversight mechanism performs as reliably and consistently.”
Several major registrars, including Donuts, Neustar and Afilias, also expressed their support for the Government’s decision.
